Mark J. Finstrom
Manager IT Department
As the IT Manager, Mark and his team manage all the firm’s devices, applications and tools used by staff. With 30 years of IT experience and job diversity, he continually looks for ways to improve and innovate services and operations while implementing security options to protect client and firm information.
Location
Support Team
- Jason Walker – IT Technician
- Ruben Andazola – Sr. System Administrator
As the IT Manager, Mark and his team manage all the firm’s devices, applications and tools used by staff. With 30 years of IT experience and job diversity, he continually looks for ways to improve and innovate services and operations while implementing security options to protect client and firm information.
Mark’s work life consists of 20+ years in agribusiness as a farmer and rancher in Iowa and South Dakota, 24 years in education (teacher and IT professional) and 6 years in business between Iowa, Minnesota, Colorado, Washington, and South Dakota. This diversity in work experience has enabled Mark to learn, assist, develop, and implement solutions that have improved business operations which have increased financial returns for each organization multi-fold over. His education and business ownership acumen allows him to assess situations with a different lens; thus, allowing him to provide feedback that has a critical eye toward business safety and growth.
Customer service is his mantra. Mark listens to the end users and seeks clarity, while upholding his integrity and meeting their needs. He works hard to explain options using lay language while seeking agreement. He enjoys technical and non-technical work and can be found on a tractor or ATV outside of work. Mark takes pride in his team’s work and loves speaking with peers to share and learn new things. It is his role, with his team’s assistance, to solve problems and keep end users always working.
Professional Affiliations
- Certified Education Technology Leader
- FEMA Certified (25+ certificates)
- FBI Citizen’s Academy
- Eide Bailly Technology Alliance
Community
- Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) member
- FCC HAM radio operator
- Red Cross certified
- HOPE Lutheran Church
- Financial Secretary & Secretary
Personal
Mark is not your typical technologist. He loves farm life. He grew up raising cattle and driving tractors and semi-trucks prior to becoming an elementary educator and a college professor. Mark and his wife have a small ranch where they raise registered Belted Galloway cattle (often referred to as Oreo cattle), along with other livestock. They love fresh produce and have a large garden that provides year-round vegetables, herbs, and fruit.
His skills go past the farm though, as he is the financial secretary as well as the council secretary for his church. If you can’t tell, Mark does not like grass to grow under his feet and he prefers to be busy every day with diverse activities. Over the years he has also served on multiple national advisory boards, has been interviewed and published, as well as been a public speaker across the country. Mark is also a licensed HAM radio operator and can be found online as “KG7KAW.”
Mark’s passions drew him into emergency management where he acquired CERT, FBI, and FEMA certificates. This led to the creation of the “mBus2” a mobile command bus and a hands-on learning bus (Maker Bus) used with students and educators – https://youtu.be/cACDmi-Aek4. Innovation and entrepreneurship are in Mark’s blood.
